Without warning

‘Goddamn, Wales, it’s been… it’s just…’ A small burning lump in her throat grew and grew, until it merged with the ache in her chest and for the first time since she had been captured, Caitlin Monroe let herself go and poured out a torrent of tears.

The rangy, silver-haired Nebraskan enfolded her within a generous bear hug and made no attempt to calm her down, as wretched, pitiful sobs and shudders racked her body.

‘I’m s-s-sorry, Wales. I failed… and…’

He shushed her and stroked her head, patting down masses of thick dark hair still wet from the shower and smelling of cheap shampoo. ‘It’s all right, Cait, it’s all right,’ he said softly. ‘You’ve been sick. I know. They told me. You shouldn’t have been out in the field, let alone trussed up in this shithole… if you’ll excuse my, er, French, Captain Rolland.’

‘But of course, it is a shithole,’ the Frenchman agreed.

Caitlin could feel Larrison’s strong heartbeat through his suit jacket, and that strength flowed through his arms and into her. She slowly regained her composure and pushed herself away.

‘How did you get here?’ she asked shakily, wiping her nose on a shirt cuff. T thought they’d grabbed you, Wales. I thought they’d rolled up the whole network.’

Larrison put one finger on her lip and bade her to be quiet. He then led her back to the couch and eased her down, before sitting himself at the other end.

‘I was in London when everything happened,’ he said. ‘I had to sit on my ass and watch it from there. I’m sorry, Caitlin. I tried to get an overwatch team to you, twice, but the DGSE had a legitimate counter-intel responsibility for shadowing us. We did spy on them, after all. They never penetrated a cell, but their Intelligence Division was aware of us. That’s how they grabbed you the first time you were here. And they blocked both teams I sent in – wiped out the first, grabbed up the other one.’

Caitlin pulled the blanket closer around her shoulders. ‘What’s left of us, Wales? Of Echelon, I mean.’

He puffed out his cheeks. ‘Every op we had running in France was taken down. Every one. With extreme prejudice. The Brits lost their people too. Would have caused a quiet, dirty little war if we hadn’t known about the Algerian School. So now, in France, I’m afraid you’re it. You’re Echelon. Our last designated hitter.’

He indicated the fort around them with a wave of his hand. Somewhere many miles away, more bombs exploded.

‘Lacan had people here, all over,’ Wales went on. ‘This Algerian School, it’s like Captain Rolland told you, they were everywhere. When we sent you after Baumer, they stepped in. He was protected as part of the… accommodation. They were always going to try to keep you off him.’

Rolland put one muddy boot on the coffee table, leaned forward and retrieved his packet of pills. ‘Normally you would have been detained, interrogated, the usual inconveniences,’ he explained. ‘But, the Disappearance, it changed everything. A massive, world-changing shock.’

‘They had contingencies,’ added Larrison. ‘In the event of some foreseeable catastrophe that would cripple the US, or financial collapse, or a nuclear strike – whatever. The Disappearance wasn’t foreseeable, but it was also a hell of a lot more than a simple catastrophe. It wiped us out.’

‘And the contingency?’ said Caitlin.

‘To finish the work of Allah,’ answered Rolland. ‘As soon as it was confirmed what had happened in America, Lacan purged the Action Division and sent his trusted people out to roll up your network. It was not just you, of course. The British also maintained Echelon cadre in France, as Monsieur Larrison explained. They too were targeted. Even your junior partners, the Canadians, Australians and New Zealanders, all of them were smothered.’

‘So, all the street fighting, the ethnic clashes – they were engineered by the School? That seems a bit far-fetched.’

Larrison, who looked so much older than the last time they had spoken, just two months ago, shook his head sadly. ‘Not all of them, Cait. A lot of violence arose naturally. Once the capstone was off, the geyser blew. But yes, some incidents were engineered to bring on a wider confrontation. An uprising. Even then it may not have worked. Conspiracies often don’t, as you would know. But Israel nuking half of the Arab world – that was a deal breaker. Race war, holy war, civil war, whatever you want to call it. It was inevitable after that. And people have been killing each other ever since.’

She moved her head carefully to look out of the windows again. The rain had turned the suburbs outside into a bleary, grey netherworld, but some elements did resolve themselves. There was no traffic, vehicular or pedestrian. The only aircraft aloft were military, and of course she had already noted that they were attacking targets within the city. There seemed to be fewer fires burning than she remembered, but the rain was heavy, and on looking more closely she could see that whole districts had already been burnt out.